Probably a dunb question about gunnery

[TweetyBird]

I was thinking about the percentage of shots made while pulling positive g's in the lift vector vs other shots ( neg g's, no g's), and it seems (from combat sims), that the vast majority of close encounters come while pulling positive g's in the lift vector. And I'm sure everyone knows the old rule the if you're turning and the guns are dead on your six, you won't be hit.

So why didn't anyone, thoughout air combat history, get the bright idea to point guns slightly up ( maybe as much as 20 degrees)? The only time having the guns pointing straight out makes any sense is assuming positive g, neg g, and no g, shots will be evenly distributed. I don't think thats close to the case of what actually happens.

I know there must be an obvious answer, but I be darn if I can think of it.

Edit:
I realize, such a setup would create more drag (I guess), but did anyone ever study the advantages? I mean it seems a plane has the most control while pulling positive g's. Why wouldn't the gun position reflect this assumption of what attitude a plane would have in close combat?

[GODO]

May be because most aerial kills were achieved against unawared targets, as well as the nedded size to accomodate large guns angled 20 degrees in the wings. Your proposal may have been an option for planes armed with guns in gondolas.

[lasersailor184]

You're assuming that the planes were *Only* used for fighting.  But that wasn't the point of them.  The point was so that they could help out the ground troops as much as possible.

If you're guns are pointed up 20degrees, then on a strafing run your plane would have to be 20 degrees pointed lower.

[Cobra412]

Tweetybird in time they did find ways to help with aerial gunnery in the way of advanced sighting systems.  But with as many factors that go into targeting with guns it's very hard to make the gunnery system better.

[Dobe]

The Germans had several aircraft with the guns at angles facing up.the 262 had a configeration with 4 30 mm facing straight up.
Several different night fighters had their guns facing at upward angles,and the pilot would fly under the enemy bomber,and open fire.These night fighters had very good results,as the Lancs had no ball turret.
Speaking of gun angles,the Bolton-Paul Defiant had no forward firing guns,only a rear turret with dual machine guns.After losing a large quanity of these fighters,the Bolton-Paul quickly fell out of favor.
Dobe

[TweetyBird]

Lol, yea I imagine manuevering a rear gun into position could be fatal lots of times